I never have much trust in putting a car on 4 axle stands. I tend to go with 2 well placed stands then something more secure. I welded up a sturdy axle stand height tressel that I use if I need to take all 4 wheels off. If 2 can stay on I tend to either just do with work one end at a time or place the other 2 wheels on something; either ramps or an old pair of wheels usually. A decent jack that lifts to a good height and rolls well enough to not drag the car towards you as it goes up is a godsend though.
My 318tds now has another 12 months MOT. It only needed one front arm bush (although I changed the pair) and some trimming of the arch liners where the lower offset 5 series wheels were catching, not bad for a 19 year old £600 car that I haven't really touched for a year!

I made some super simple but really effective bike mounts for my cars roof bars the other day as a bit of a spur of the moment thing.
I'll get some photos of them in use, but basically they just bolt to the channel in my roof bars and the front axle bolts through them. One suits a 20mm, one suits a 15x110 and the last one's a 15x100, to suit my bike and the 2 friends I'd planned a ride with. I might make a couple more soon to cover more combinations of friends bikes. As my car's an estate I can set the roof bars far enough apart that the rear wheel sits on the other bar and just gets strapped straight to it. They've cost me nothing and they're small enough I can throw them in one of the cubby-holes in the boot and bolt them on when needed.

I'm technically a design engineer who doesn't get his hands dirty at work but due to our usual fabricator being on paternity leave I've ended up knocking this together over the last 2 weeks:
I was meant to just design it then hand it over to the other guys, but I've ended up doing all the welding/fabricating, helping with installing it (using just a forklift and man-power!) and today I did the concrete screed in the treads.
That brewing set-up looks interesting. I need to get my head around automation electronics and programming sometime soon, it'd be bloody handy for work. (and my own projects.)

Thanks for the extra tips guys. I'm happy to say that time's done its job and the laptop's lost it's stench all by its self. I'll be well armed next time I have to take it to a food waste site though!
JT, smelling the way it did there would have been no chance of me putting it anywhere near a container meant for food!

What state's it in these days Paul? If any bits off mine could be of use let me know as I'll be reusing very few original bits. Although most of my bits are pretty ropey there's a few that might be useful.
I finally got my order placed with Gaz. I should admit I hadn't been chasing them much as I've been mega busy at work helping sort out our new building, and there's been some back and forth to decide on spec, rather than just one call to place an order.
A set of their 'gold' coilovers with custom rears to ditch the torsion bars should be arriving in about 4 weeks (made to order).

Thanks mike. The fact they were starting to creep up in price was a fair bit of the nudge I needed to buy mine. I wish I'd bought a less knackered one, but I'm glad I bought one all the same!
Still not heard anything from gaz unfortunately. I'm eager to get an order placed and get some dimensions out of them so I can get some laser cut stuff ordered for the suspension arms. Hopefully they'll get in touch soon.

As it's quiet, and most of you have probably forgotten I even have a car, here's a random recent photo of my very much work in progress Porsche 924:
Happily I'm basically done with welding up the shell now. All the rust's gone, and there's a cage in it. I still need to sort some damage in the rear quarter, but thats not holding anything else up, so it's time to worry about something to attach some wheels to!
I'm talking to Gaz at the moment about some coilovers so I can ditch the torsion bars at the back and make up a new subframe and arms. Should be an interesting little project to have a go at.

Count me in for this. Trying to think back to uni times but the pubs we went to tended not to have parking (because you know, oxford + students). The only one we ever went to with cars was the harvester in Wheatley, it's a generic chain place just off a dual carrageway but wasn't terrible and it's easy to find with plenty of parking. Hopefully someone local will know somewhere better, but I suspect it'll have to be outside oxford it's self. Oxford and parking don't really go together!
There's a kart track just off the ring road that's shonky enough to be a good laugh if we were near Oxford and wanted something to do.

Sounds right to me. 12v is 12v, the only thing it could change by not being a bulb is the current draw, but it's very, very unlikely that a little solenoid has a higher draw than a halogen bulb, so it should be safe with the factory wiring. Also, while it's a slightly sketchy attitude, if it doesn't work, that's why Seat put a fuse in for you .
I believe the HID bulb should also draw less current than a halogen, so there shouldn't be any need for any new relays for what you're doing.
The only thing I can think of that could cause issues would be if the original halogens used a twin filament lamp like a H4, because they cut the feed to the dipped bean when they switch to full, meaning your flaps would be open, but everything would go rather dark. In which case you'd want to sort something out with a relay to remain open for both dipped and full beam, but the flaps to open only with high.